On the second floor of the building I found the office and private laboratory 333 of the under-director of the Pasteur Institute, a man whose researches in connection with Pasteur, whose devotion in the cholera mission in Egypt in 1883, and whose independent investigations on diphtheria, have made him famous in the medical world. The office was small, and it had something of the attraction of a curio shop. There was none of the precision of the man of small affairs here. It was the confusion of the man of big affairs, who cannot endure to have his things meddled with. Over a table where culture tubes, blow-pipes, virus glasses and bottles filled with suspicious-looking fluids were scattered promiscuously around a valuable microscope, hung a gem of a painting—a dashing charge of cavalry. Beside a case of books, and partly concealing a fine portrait of Pasteur, hung the gray-white laboratory blouses of M. Roux. Under an exquisite etching askew in a corner stood a cage of brown-and-white guinea-pigs, martyrs to science, probably.
AT THE JUBILEE OF M. PASTEUR. THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC WELCOMING M. PASTEUR IN THE AMPHITHEATRE OF THE OLD SORBONNE.
Curiosity was cut short, for a quick step was heard in the outer room, and Doctor Roux entered. A slight figure, bent a little from a life spent over books, tubes and microscopes, but tingling to the finger-tips with nervous energy; a face a little pale, but fresh in color; brown hair and beard, glowing brown eyes, perhaps forty years—such is this eminent associate of Pasteur. As he runs over the pile of letters cut and awaiting him, he talks.
“So you have just seen the inoculation? Do I believe it a sure cure?” The doctor lays down his letters as he repeats the latter question in an astonished tone. “Of course I do. There is nothing surer in medical science. Look at these figures.” He rises and draws out from the midst of a pile of papers a big black serviette, fumbles for a moment among the documents it contains, and pulls out the latest report made by the Institute on the results of vaccination for hydrophobia, that for 1891.
“Now listen to these figures. In 1886 the Pasteur made its first report: 2,671 persons were vaccinated that year against hydrophobia; 25 of them died—.94 of one per cent. In 1887, 1,770 persons were treated; 13 died—.73 of one per cent. In 1888, 1,622 were treated; 9 died—.55 of one per cent. In 1889, 1,830 were treated; 7 died—.38 of one per cent. In 1890, 1,540 were treated; 5 died—.32 of one per cent. In 1891, 1,559 were treated; 3 died—.19 of one per cent. You notice each year the per cent. of deaths has been lower. In the six years the treatment has been reported, we average just about one-half of one per cent of loss. Tell me where you find a treatment surer?”
“But you have not found the microbe?”
“Humph! that does not prevent the method working. It is aggravating not to have found him. It prevents, possibly, the simplification of the inoculation process. Nevertheless it works. So does vaccination for small-pox. We do not know the microbe of small-pox. There is much we do not know yet. Remember, too, that it was only in 1880 that M. Pasteur made up his mind to begin an exhaustive study of hydrophobia, and that all he foresaw at first was the possibility of vaccinating dogs 334 against rabies, and that it was only in 1885 that the first person, little Joseph Meister, was inoculated, after a council of physicians had decided that his death was certain, and that his life was saved.”